CRY OUT TO JESUS
We can come to Jesus with anything. There is no situation too desperate for Jesus. Francis Schaeffer, a great Christian writer and evangelist during the 20th century, tells a story in one of his books about a time when he almost died. He was flying back to the United States from Europe, and he is in an airplane over the North Atlantic Ocean. It is 1947 and he was flying in an old DC4, which had two engines on each wing. It was night and he couldn’t see much out the window, but all of a sudden he hears the two engines on one wing just stop.
Schaeffer had flown a lot, and he knew something was very wrong. He began thinking, “we’re going to go into the ocean.” No one was panicking or acting like there was anything wrong, so Schaeffer commented to one of the flight attendants that there seemed to be something wrong with the engines. She dismissed him though, telling him that everyone always thought there was something wrong with the engines. It was then that the lights in the plane went on, and the pilot came over the speaker and told everyone that they were in trouble and needed to put on their life jackets. Even as he was saying this the plane started dipping down and fell. It got so low to the water that even during a night with no moon you could see the waves breaking in the darkness.
As they were falling towards the ocean, Schaeffer was praying. Interestingly enough, Schaeffer found out later that the pilots sent out an SOS that was picked up and broadcast all over the United States, telling everyone there was a plane crashing into the middle of the Atlantic Ocean. Schaeffer’s wife heard this. She didn’t know which plane was in trouble, but knew her husband was on one, so she gathered their three daughters together and all of them prayed. They were praying in St. Louis and he was praying on the plane as it was going down. As the waves were getting bigger, all of sudden the two engines started. The plane was able to level out, and they were able to keep going until they could land at the nearest airport.
When they landed, Schaeffer asked the pilot what had happened. “Well,” he said, “it’s a strange thing, something we can’t explain. Only rarely do two motors stop on one wing, but you can make an absolute rule that when they do, they don’t start again. We don’t understand it.” Schaeffer looked at him and said, “I can explain it.” The pilot asked “how?” Schaeffer responded, “My Father in heaven started it because I was praying.” The pilot looked at him with a strange face and turned away.
How many of us really believe that Jesus can act when it seems all hope is gone? We say we believe in the supernatural, in a God who can do whatsoever he pleases, but how often do we really live like it? We say we believe in a God who answers prayer, but how many of us come to Jesus and trust him to respond to us, even when all other hope seems exhausted? Our situation might not be as urgent as a plane going down into the ocean, but whatever we’re experiencing, it matters to God. No matter how desperate our situation is, we can trust Jesus.
Christ was crucified in weakness so that we can live in the power of God. Jesus died so that we can experience life from death; he lost his very life so that we could live forever. He endured the suffering of the cross because of the joy set before him, and he did it for us. He alone has the power of life over death; he is the one we must trust even when it seems all hope is gone. We can, and we must, cry out to Jesus.